A CRM Isn’t Optional if You Expect to Grow Your Business

A CRM isn’t optional; it is the backbone of growth for entrepreneurs, and it is a foundational decision that must be made early on in your business. Exiting corporate to tackle entrepreneurship is a shift from managing teams to managing everything. Suddenly, there’s no IT department, no marketing staff, and no assistant to track your follow-ups. The systems that once kept your day in motion are gone, and in their place is a blinking cursor and a growing list of to-do tasks. 

Even if you don’t have a single customer yet, you must be ready for them. Where do the lead generation, nurturing, trust-building and calls to action come from and in what order? The customer journey is a serious marketing strategy you just make before you send an email or make a call. All of that is mapped out in your CRM or Customer Relationship Management software.  

Let’s Break it Down 

Customer Relationship Management (CRM) is your business engine. It remembers every customer, every lead, every email, and every moment of interest that might otherwise slip through the cracks. It tracks where each person is in the purchasing process. If you’re still managing contacts through your inbox, you’re flying blind. The inbox is reactive as you wait for something to happen. A CRM is proactive; it tells you what’s happening and what to do next. Email and contact list in your Outlook or Google Workspace isn’t sustainable,  scalable and if used for marketing to prospects, legal.  

A CRM helps you: 

• Capture and organize leads automatically, so you don’t lose names, emails, or opportunities. 

• See trends in real time, like which customers engage most or what content gets the highest response. 

• Automate repetitive work like follow-ups, reminders, or thank-you notes so you can focus on relationships instead of routine. 

• Build a real asset: your contact list. Your CRM data is your business equity. It’s what investors, partners, and buyers value most because it represents real audience engagement, not vanity metrics. 

• Self-segmenting. Top of funnel contacts can be segmented by “intent” with just a couple of pieces of information which makes your next “touch” or follow-up with them more personalized and intentional.  

If you’ve spent your career working for someone else, you’ve likely relied on tools and systems that were already built. As a founder, you must now build your own. CRM is part of your digital business framework. It should be doing the heavy lifting for you.  

The Cost of Not Having a CRM 

Let’s talk about what happens when you don’t have a CRM. 

Missed follow-ups, duplicate contacts, no visibility into who’s moving through the funnel or responding to a call to action. A lost lead isn’t just a missed sale; it’s a message that your business isn’t ready. Inconsistent communication creates distrust, even if your product or service is excellent. Engagement builds trust and is the key to creating a ready-to-act buyer.  

A CRM is not just a database; it’s a roadmap of your relationships, chock full of analytics. 

A 2023 Small Business Trends report found that companies using a CRM increased customer retention by up to 27% and sales productivity by over 30%. That’s not a number you can ignore; that’s operational efficiency turning into profit. 

Yes, a good CRM is going to cost something. Don’t be tempted to try a “free” version that gets you to load up your contacts, gives you a little functionality and then as soon as you need a higher-level solution, the subscription cost accelerates and you’re locked in. Do your homework and choose wisely.  

Case Study — How a Business Coach Turned a CRM into a Growth Engine  

A leadership coach I worked with ran a solo practice offering executive coaching and small-group masterminds for women leaders. Her biggest challenge wasn’t lack of interest; it was follow-through. Leads came in through workshops, webinars, and networking, but she had no system to track them, segment them, or nurture them toward paid programs. Contacts sat scattered across spreadsheets, LinkedIn messages, and email threads. 

She adopted Constant Contact not just for newsletters but as a lightweight CRM and automation tool. 

Implementation: 

• Centralized her contacts. 
  My client imported every lead—past workshop attendees, referral prospects, LinkedIn subscribers—into one organized list. Tags were applied like:
• Webinar Lead” 
• “Past Client” 
• Corporate HR Contact” 
• “Mastermind Prospect.” 

This alone gave her visibility into where every relationship stood in her funnel. 

• Automated follow-up sequences. 
  Each new lead who downloaded her “Leadership Burnout Recovery” guide received a timed nurture sequence: 
• Day 1: Thank-you email + short video about her coaching approach 
• Day 3: Client success story 
• Day 6: Link to schedule a 15-minute clarity call 

The CRM automation handled this completely—no manual emailing, no lost leads. 

• Behavior-based tracking. 
  When someone clicked on a link to book a call but didn’t complete it, the system tagged them as “Warm Lead.” She filtered these each Friday and personally followed up. 
• Re-engagement campaigns. 
  Past clients who hadn’t interacted for six months received a “Where Are You Now?” email series with a new free masterclass invite. This rekindled dormant relationships. 

Results after 6 months: 

• Her lead-to-consultation conversion rate jumped from 8% to 21%. 

• The automation series booked 3× more calls per month than before. 

• “Re-engaged” past clients brought in $18,000 in repeat program revenue in one quarter. 

• Email open rates rose from 22% to 44%, a signal that segmentation matched her audience interests. 

The system effectively turned into her sales and relationship dashboard—a functional CRM without enterprise complexity. 

Why it worked: 

• She stopped relying on memory and manual follow-up; automation ensured consistent contact. 

• Segmentation let her send relevant offers—corporate leadership programs to HR managers, mindset coaching to individuals. 

• Analytics revealed what content converted; she doubled down on what worked. 

• She could finally see her revenue pipeline—who was a lead, who was warm, and who was ready to buy.  

How This Translates to Your Own Business 

Whether you’re a coach, consultant, or digital-service provider, I recommend Constant Contact software as your start-up CRM.  

You can: 

• Tag and segment contacts by where they entered your world (workshop, opt-in, referral). 

• Build automated email journeys that nurture trust. 

• Use engagement data to identify warm prospects for personal outreach. 

• Tie your calls-to-action (book a discovery call, enroll in a course, join a community) directly into measurable sales results. 

Automation doesn’t replace the human connection—it protects it by ensuring your message reaches the right people at the right time. 

How to Choose the Right CRM 

Forget the enterprise-level monsters you used in corporate life. You don’t need 400 features you’ll never touch. You need clarity, automation, and data that tells a story. 

When evaluating a CRM, ask: 

• Is it easy to learn and ready to go out of the box? 

• Does it integrate with your email marketing, scheduling tools, and website? 

• Can it automate simple follow-ups and segment audiences by interest? 

• Will it give you visibility into who’s engaging and what’s converting? 

• Is it cost effective for a start-up budget?  

• Do they have live, on-demand, call-in customer service at every subscription level?  

Why Constant Contact Is Built for This Stage of Business 

When I started Innovate, I tested half a dozen platforms. Most were built for tech teams or data analysts, not for entrepreneurs juggling ten things at once. Constant Contact stood out because it understood small business realities. 

It’s not just an email tool; it’s a revenue system. 

Constant Contact combines CRM, email marketing, list management, ai, automation, and analytics in one place. You can collect leads from your website or social media, tag and segment them automatically, and send personalized messages that convert. The reporting dashboard shows you exactly who opened, clicked, and acted: no guesswork, no spreadsheets. 

From an ROI perspective, email marketing through Constant Contact delivers one of the highest returns in digital marketing, $36 for every $1 spent, according to multiple industry studies. That’s a staggering number, and it’s not magic, it’s simple math. You’re reaching people who already chose to hear from you, directly in their inbox, without competing with algorithms or ad costs. 

Don’t Give Your Biggest Asset to Mark Z.  

What makes it even more powerful is ownership. Social media platforms are rented space; you’re building your business on borrowed land. Your CRM and email list, on the other hand, are owned assets. They belong to you, not a platform. And Constant Contact helps you turn those assets into measurable growth. 

Imagine seeing a 20% click rate on your newsletter because your audience is engaged, not just scrolling. Imagine knowing exactly which clients opened your service offer and following up at the right moment. No social media platform can do this. You just get bucket numbers from them.  

Next Steps: 

I give referred information from people I trust careful consideration. When you have a thousand options, this helps narrow the time you need to do your due diligence. 15 years ago, I took a Constant Contact free seminar and at the time, they were revolutionizing digital marketing for entrepreneurs. They are here, still, and championing those same businesses. They are an industry standard with a 97% deliverability rate on email marketing, have added valuable tools to their digital toolbox for entrepreneurs and have kept things simple enough that you don’t need to hire an expert to do the work. It addresses the challenges and optimizes the tech so you experience early wins.  

This is why I use Constant Contact in our LAUNCH framework – cost, simplicity, time saved and time given back. You can start a free trial or a monthly subscription for about $12. Use the link below to get started and you’ll be ready for any of my LAUNCH trainings going forward.  

Register Here 

A Note from Suzette 

If you’re ready to put these pieces in place, join me for the LAUNCH 101 Webinar: a live, strategy-focused intensive where you’ll learn what it takes to define your niche, shape your offer, and present a clear call to action. You’ll leave with access to the LAUNCH framework that leads you to fast implementation with immediate action steps. 

👉 Register here: https://innovatelaunch.mykajabi.com/launch-101 

One System. One Focus. Real Progress.